


Desperation and Youth; A Dance in the Tuchanka Dawn

by Achievelandia



Series: Desperation and Youth; The Archaeologist and the Battlemaster. [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Tuchanka, Wrex is old, melding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-12
Updated: 2013-10-12
Packaged: 2017-12-29 04:12:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1000737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Achievelandia/pseuds/Achievelandia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wrex is old and now, more than ever, feels lost in the ebb and flow of the galaxy. He does not know if there is hope for his race, he does not know if Shepard will ever return... but what he does know, is that Doctor Liara T'Soni will be by his side whatever happens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Desperation and Youth; A Dance in the Tuchanka Dawn

Krogans weren’t typically viewed as the most sensitive race, even in the Traverse where Batarians regularly made it their business to rape and murder anyone they came across, but Wrex was by far one of the least sensitive of his kind. He had lived many years and seen countless atrocities, even played his own part in several genocides and seen the humans rise to their spacefaring pedestal. Six hundred years was a long time, and this year he wanted something special for his birthday. He had been craving company for some time since Shepard’s death in 2183, leaving the crew was necessary but it still left him feeling bereft - despite his redundant nervous system and sturdy krogan demeanor nothing could detract from the fact that the crew had been more of a family to him than even his own blood had.

It was to his great surprise then, that Liara arrived on Tuchanka two days before his birthday and presented him with a large bottle of Ryncol and one of her enigmatic smiles. Despite the little contact he had with the Asari he found that he was glad to see her, the fact that she knew it was his birthday and made the effort to journey all the way out to the barren wastes that he was attempting to reform made him think that she wanted something but he couldn’t be sure what. After all, she was an Asari, they were damn resourceful on their own. It was only when she came to sit beside his throne one night with a bottle of her own liquor that he found out the true purpose of her visit. Her slurred words were somewhat amusing to him.

“You know what, Wrex... I _hate_ history. I dedicated half of my life to figuring out *hic* what happened to the damn Protheans and it turns out that they... They were just as powerless as we are, fumbling in the dark and hoping that *hic* something will come and save us. I mean, the entire galaxy was relying on Shepard, that’s hardly fair at all. It’s not right to put all of that on one race let alone... Let alone one woman.”

The sombre note creeping into her words stirred him somewhat, after all she was right, but she didn’t need to be thinking that - especially not with a belly full of Sorrow’s Companion and her whole life ahead of her.

“You’re just a kid, Liara. You don’t need to be thinking about death and the end of the galaxy. At your age a Krogan would still be four feet tall, grubbing around in the mud and wrestling with Varren. It’s no age to be so... Depressing.”

Liara looked stunned at that, watching Wrex carefully and wondering where on earth all of this was coming from. Wrex was not the give of comfort, he was the rock and the strength that the crew clung to as Shepard disappeared into the distance. He was the one who had looked almost bored at her funeral. Seeing him now, sat on his throne ruling his people, Liara could not see that Shepard’s death had affected the krogan Battlemaster at all. Yet it seemed that her estimations were off, as they often were. Reading people was not her strong suit, though she had always thought she did a good job with Wrex, now it was clear that everything she had assumed about the krogan, the ruler, the biotic tank - even his age - had all been... Flawed.

“We all miss her, Wrex.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don- *hic* don’t lie to me, Wrex. Commander Shepard became everything to us, our light, our world, the only hope that maybe we could deal with this great thing trying to crush us. Nobody understands what you’re going through more than we do.”

Wrex had growled at that, stood and shook his head hard to clear the Ryncol, “You don’t know what you’re saying! I killed my own father over a difference of opinion, in a sacred place where no harm is supposed to come to us... and felt nothing. Do not talk to me of _missing_ her. You are too young to truly understand!”

And then her hand was at his elbow and her thoughts were touching his. He felt the desperation clawing at her, and she felt his growing sense of mortality, his fears that the Krogan would never truly unite and a great and beautiful species would be lost. She shared his fears, and he her desperation. By the time their minds broke apart the long night had ended and the sun was just cresting the ruined buildings and making it’s way through the holes in the roof of Wrex’s settlement. They had been melded for hours and not seen the time pass, simply sharing what little they had. Liara found much wisdom in Wrex’s old mind and Wrex found much hope in Liara’s youth. It was then that Wrex _truly_ realised the reason for Liara’s coming to Tuchanka, and why he had felt so desolate without the crew. The connection that they had shared was more than anything he had ever experienced in all his years, and he would do anything to experience it again. But he would not ask Liara to stay with him, he knew that Tuchanka was no place for a young Asari seeking to grow and broaden her mind. Seeming to sense his thoughts, Liara turned to face him, her blue skin shining in the orange light of Tuchanka dawn.

“I think that your ruins demand an archaeologist, and since studying the Protheans seems pointless now... I think I’ll change my area of study. Get used to me, Wrex.”

And that is the story of how the daughter of Matriarch Benezia, the foremost Prothean scientist of the time, came to keep the old Krogan company in his attempts to change the future of his race. None were to know if he would succeed but simply having her by his side, listening to her talk about his species with such passion as she had once talked about the Protheans, it made him proud... Both to be Krogan, and to have had his time on the Normandy, saving the galaxy.


End file.
